Early Romance Reward Members Check Your Balance

If you're like me you'll find you just lost 20 nights. These were the points that were converted to nights about 4 years ago. Not complaining, just informing in case you were counting on those perks for any upcoming trips.

ORV,
Thanks for the heads up!
I just went in to check our nights and found that according to them 9 nights had expired and they never gave us credit for our stay in 2010 at CSS. I don't understand how nights can expire when we have been to Couples for the last 6 years straight for either 7 or 8 nights each time and we only have 24 nights credit.
Hope they get it corrected soon, we will be back in CSS in 28 days.

If you're like me you'll find you just lost 20 nights. These were the points that were converted to nights about 4 years ago. Not complaining, just informing in case you were counting on those perks for any upcoming trips.

We just lost 9 nights. Was thinking we would be at the Passionate Love level for our trip to CN this December but... it's back to Renewed Love level once again!

If you're like me you'll find you just lost 20 nights. These were the points that were converted to nights about 4 years ago. Not complaining, just informing in case you were counting on those perks for any upcoming trips.

Thanks for the heads up. That just dropped us to to 23 nights - one shy of the Passionate Level we're used to. Now I will readily admit that, due to the points to nights conversion, we originally hadn't "earned" our Passionate Level. But we've now accrued a legitimate 28 nights. So we'll lose $50 in resort credits - no biggie. But the couples massage? HUGE bummer... It's really unfortunate that next year will be our sixth trip in eight years - not as many as a lot of repeaters, but still respectable, I think - and we now feel like our continued patronage is less appreciated.

I've never liked this rolling credit-drop thing. After all these trips, if we take four years off, it'll be like we've never come at all............

Last edited by BruceandKelli; March 17th, 2012 at 10:57 AM.
Reason: full disclosure

ugh, we lost 20 nights as well. that stinks. that bumps us down from passionate all the way down to young love for our upcoming visit in April. Which means we will only be getting a $600 resort credit instead of the $700 I was expecting ($100 romance reward, $500 early booking reward). We can only afford to come home every other year, which means with the 4-year expiration policy, we will be knocked down to young love every other trip and only able to get up to renewed love. Oh well, glad we were able to enjoy the couples massage on our last two trips! Guess we might just have to use some of our resort credits to pay for a massage this time, cause couples massage in the treehouse in the early AM is absolutely one of the best things about the trip! Honestly, anything extra received is above and beyond what other resorts do, and really the perk I most enjoy about being a repeater is the smiles and hugs I get from the wonderful staff members who remember us!! 27 more sleeps!!!

We lost 12, but are still at passionate level (for now). Guess we just have to stay longer each trip!!! Too bad there is not a way to "buy" nights with your resort credit at a discounted rate, like buying airline miles.

I feel like a beginner again. Oh well, the Romance Rewards was never a huge selling point for us anyway. Though it was nice getting that generous resort credit the last couple of trips. Guess we will be starting again with our 14 points from the last three years.

Oh wait, we lose half of those in another year or two don't we? I really don't understand how this thing works. We will just take what we get and not worry about it.

ORV, THanks for the heads up on this one! Just checked ours too and we're down to 17 since we missed going 3 years ago! We were at top level last year with the couples massages etc, and now will be missing that although did book with the $300 resort credit with 7 nights so hope nothing gets in the way of that! it's like the other years are of no consideration any more :-(

Bruceandkelli,
Hi guys,
We met a couple of years ago at I think it was CN, but not shure.
We have earned 32 nights in the last 4 years and they only havr us credited for 24. They missed our 2012 trip to CSS for 8 nights! I contacted the R/R department and questioned the missing nights. The next e.mail will be to Randymon. I hope they take cars of this. We leave for CSS again on 13 April and we don't want to meet out on the perks. We will be at CN next year over the fourth of July. We had a blast last year at the pool bar with everyone in Red, White and Blue.
Phinns Up

We just had 31 nights dropped from the original conversion. Fortunately, we are still at Passionate Level, as we spend 10-12 days every year.

I agree, it's not a perfect system, but it's their system, and it's clearly stated on the Romance Rewards page. It will just be much harder to earn that massage, although you can use your resort credits.

Like you guys, I'm sure we'd still go, even if we didn't get anything as perks.

We lost 32 nights. I emailed the RR congierge and was told the nights expire after 4 years. It doesn't matter that we have been to Couples up to 3 times a year - every year since they started this program. Rules are Rules - 4 years after you earn the nights - you loose them. This doesn't seem right to me but I haven't had a chance to send Randymon a letter. Maybe someone from Couples could step in here and explain this to everyone. I've never been part of a reward program that reduces your status after a certain number of years when you are still an active participant in the program.

Me too, just lost 28 nights, down to renewed love, by 1 point! Really sad when we head back to CN in April we won't be getting the couples massage, which we always upgrded to 1 hour. I have always appreciated this program, but I think with the repeaters that return at least once a year it could have been handled a little differently.

Bruceandkelli,
Hi guys,
We met a couple of years ago at I think it was CN, but not shure.
We have earned 32 nights in the last 4 years and they only havr us credited for 24. They missed our 2012 trip to CSS for 8 nights! I contacted the R/R department and questioned the missing nights. The next e.mail will be to Randymon. I hope they take cars of this. We leave for CSS again on 13 April and we don't want to meet out on the perks. We will be at CN next year over the fourth of July. We had a blast last year at the pool bar with everyone in Red, White and Blue.
Phinns Up

From what I've been told you want to check before you leave the resort that they have your stay recorded for the Rewards. I know it's too late know, but in the future always check.

Hmmm, We sure have. Airlines, Hotels, Car Rentals... all of them start to drop member status if frequency of business declines annually.
Occasionally I've been granted my former higher status despite not earning it in for another year or so, but I take that as a marketing attempt, and it has been a rare occurrence at that.

Hi Rudi,
Just to clarify about your comment. Our frequency and the number of days we visit Couples (CSA) has not dropped since 2008. It has increased. We used to only visit once a year for 7 days. We are now up to 3 times a year and my next visit in 2 weeks is for 15 days. I would completely understand if we had not been returning every year or on a regular basis. We are lucky that our level in the RR program has not changed but I find it disappointing and confusing to have the number of days reduced and potentially our status we we continue to return regularly.

Wow no kidding, knocked back to young love. Only 2 times in the last 3 years wont get it I guess. You have to go when they are giving all the resort dollars as incentives apperantly. My wife will not like losing the message.

We've gone every year except one (and even then, it was only an 18-month gap) with 6 visits total. We've been dropped down to the second-to-lowest repeater category and, even if we go this year (which we can't because the pricing jumped up so much for our December trip between last year and this), we'd be at the lowest level of repeater next year.

Original points were very generous

I always figured that those original "conversion" points were VERY generous. We received 31 nights in the conversion, and we had never spent nearly that many nights. So, now we've all gone back to what we would have been if we hadn't received those "coversion" points.

Keeping up a "passionate" level of romance rewards is really going to be work from now on. I guess that's why they are calling it "passionate".

Hey Rudi, Since the other thread was closed, I appreciate the lesson but I've been talking about this for a while, actually I bought this up months ago but the other thread was also locked and completely deleted. Personally I think the people that lost 20 nights all at once should have lost them gradually, maybe 5 a year over four years . As stated in the other thread by Randymon ,if you go at least once every 4 years then you should stay at the same level. Yes that would work great, UNLESS YOU LOSE 20 POINTS ALL AT ONCE! I do not believe the way this SPECIAL SITUATION was handled is fair nor generous. It should have been given more consideration.

From the other thread. Posted by Rudi;

"Originally Posted by ORV

"This is nothing new, it's been the rule for quite some time now. ..."

What is new is that many people are losing points at the same time.
All participants in the former program had their credits converted to "points" on 3/14/08. So four years later, on 3/14/12, a large number of points expired for everyone in one big wave. It was predetermined and I'm sure at some point in time Couples management knew this was coming.

Personally if I ran marketing and a website in a situation such as this I might have gotten in front of it by posting something (say in Jan or Feb) like "hey everyone, reminder that 3/14/12 is 4 years later and your converted points expire, so book now..." But hey that's just me" End post by Rudi

Hey Rudi, Since the other thread was closed, I appreciate the lesson but I've been talking about this for a while...

I knew that you understood the situation and wasn't attempting to provide a lesson to you; rather I was using your sentiment in an attempt to explain the situation to others on that thread- probably should've done so without quoting your post.

After re-reading my dig at R'mon in the locked thread, I would edit it to be slightly less d*ckish, but I can't edit posts on a locked thread. Oh well.

I understand the expiration of points from Couples perspective as a business decision. Which for them the goal would be to encourage repeat visits and loyalty while controlling expenses and weighing the cost/risk/reward ratio.

I also, however, see the client side of it especially with the economy the way is has been for a few years. I would venture to guess that most people can't take a 7 day vacation every year to couple's, let alone longer stays and more than once per year. Looking at that if you even stayed once a year for about 7 days you would always have 28 days. But if you take off a year you would drop a leve or two. Not to mention it would take until your 4th year in the program to get to the highest level.

Losing those initial points to nights conversion all at the same time really sets you back in the program and would take a few years of going EVERY year to build back up. I wish we could go every year, it's just not going to happen when you have family to take on vacation too.

My opinion would be to ease the pain and have those original points/nights expire over time, i.e. the most that will expire is 7 nights per year.

One way to look at it...you need 24 points/nights to maintain passionate level. So if you are currently in the passionate level, you could remain at that level if you were to go at least 8 nights every three out of four years (8 nights x 3 years = 24 points/nights). And the value lost by slipping down from passionate level to renewed level is approximately $150 (loss of couples massage $100 + loss of resort credit $50).

But if you went for 72 nights in one year and didn't go again for 4 years, you would lose all 72 points/nights and have to completely start over. That doesn't seem exactly fair when you compare it against the example above. So I think that zambam's suggestion of limiting expiration of points/nights to 7 or 8 nights per year is a great idea for exactly this type of situation.